Human beings are, at best, disgusting and depraved creatures. This was proven again (as if it needed to be) when dozens of people in China showed exactly how deeply depraved we human beings can be.

On October 13th, on a busy street in the Guangfo Hardware Market in China, a toddler walks across the road and is struck by not one, but two vehicles, neither of whom could be bothered to stop check on the child they had just run over.

That isn’t even the worst of it, as horrifying as that thought is…

The worst of it is the dozens of bystanders that just carried on as if nothing at all had happened… while a two-year-old girl, Yue Yue, lay dying in the middle of the street.

One newspaper said a total of 18 people ignored the child as she lay bleeding and battered in the middle of the road. She died this week from her injuries and I doubt anything would have changed that outcome, sadly. Being run over by two vehicles causes a lot of damage to the human body, and even more so to a child’s.

Lest anyone be so ignorant as to believe this is a Chinese problem, rest assured it is not.

Here in Canada we have serving RCMP members acting equally depraved.

RCMP Corporal Monty Robinson, for example, walked away from the scene of the accident where he killed 21-year-old Orion Hutchinson, and later claimed he was concerned about getting his kids home.

Any man with a shred of character in his body would render first aid to the man that lay dying in the street, but not Corporal Monty Robinson. Getting his kids home and downing a quick couple of shots of vodka was far more important than attempting to save a man’s life.

So no, we Canadians are hardly the sort of people that can lay claim to being “superior” to anyone.

Really, we must be worse if a man sworn to protect the public, an RCMP Corporal no less, is willing to act so depravedly. At least in China it was just “regular” citizens, not serving policemen, who ignored the poor child’s bleeding and broken body.

On October 27th, two weeks after the world witnessed the depths of human depravity in China, it witnessed some of the best of humanity on a busy Vancouver street near Vancouver International Airport.

Total strangers got out of their vehicles and hauled survivors out of the burning plane that ultimately took the life of the pilot and seriously injured the co-pilot.

To quote Frank Hilliard’s blog post about the plane crash:

Truckers unclipped fire extinguishers from their vans, motorists jumped out of their vehicles and rushed to the burning wreckage. Some got the rear exit door open and entered the cabin to extract the passengers. One by one they were pulled, dragged and carried out.
All this—ALL this—occurred before the fire and police services made it to the scene.

What wonderful people! This is bravery on a level and in a danger equivalent to wartime. This was life and death, for the passengers and for their rescuers. No one flinched from their duty. They just did it. They were all heroes.

Where we citizens of a depraved world can hold our heads high is when people just like you and me simply do the right thing because it’s there, right in front of us, needing to be done.

Where we must hang our heads in complete and total shame is when our fellow citizens, people just like us, walk by as a child lays dying in the street.

That plane crash and its heroes isn’t very far from where RCMP Constable Monty Robinson left Orion Hutchinson to die in the middle of the street.

Kinda puts a damper on feeling good about the bravery and heroic acts of Vancouverites, doesn’t it?

2 thoughts on “The worst of Mankind and the Best of Mankind”

After reading your column on the vagaries of Mankind’s behaviour, I was again reminded of scholarly remarks imparted by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas in his classic “Be Not Afraid” speech that seemed appropriate to share for this occasion.

“During my youth there were many wonderful sayings, now considered trite, that
provided cryptic, yet prescient guidance for my life,” he said.

“Among them was one based on Luke 12:48: ‘To whom much is given of him much is required.’ Perhaps such sentiments are embarrassing in sophisticated company today, but I continue to believe this with all my heart.

“I do believe that we are required to wade into those things that matter to our country and our culture, no matter what the disincentives are, and no matter the personal cost.

“There is not one among us who wants to be set upon, or obligated to do and say difficult things. Yet, there is not one of us who could in good conscience stand by and watch a loved one or a defenseless person—or a vital national principle—perish alone, undefended, when our intervention could make all the difference.

“This may well be too dramatic an example. But nevertheless, put most simply: if we think that something is dreadfully wrong, then someone has to do something.”